CONYERS, GA – A stunning revelation came to light earlier this week, when Civil War historians unearthed what is believed to be the remains of a forty-foot tall, 100 foot-long, 120” cannon. “This is unbelievable”, smiled Dr. Andrew Golden, a senior history professor at Georgia Tech University and a military historian for the Smithsonian. “Finally, one hundred forty three years later, here’s the proof of the charges.”

The “charges” Dr. Golden spoke of, were the assertions by the Lincoln Administration that the Confederate States of America, the group of southern states that began secession from the Union in 1860, harbored secret weapons of destruction (WoD), paving the way for the technology that would later create weapons of mass destruction (WMD). “This is literally ‘Lincoln’s Cannon’”, Dr. Golden beamed, referring to the term that was coined to connote the pursuit of false goals, akin to a “wild goose chase”. For years, trying to prove the existence of such a weapon became Dr. Golden’s “Cannon”. “Now everyone will finally see that I’m not nuts”, he laughed hysterically.

The controversy originally arose in 1861, when Lincoln claimed that the south harbored WoD that they planned to sell to confederate agitators to unleash on the Union. After five years of war, the weapons were never found and Lincoln later retracted his original statements, saying that the point of the conflict had been to liberate the slaves. Few ever believed in Lincoln again, and the questionable existence of the weapons in question became known, collectively, as “Lincoln’s Cannon”. Now, one hundred forty three years later, Lincoln has seemingly been vindicated.

“This is major,” said Josh Howard, a post-graduate student working with Dr. Golden. “I mean, look at the width of that barrel – ten feet. That could take out a small village”. When asked if there was any evidence of its use, he replied that they need more time to do research. “We don’t know that it was ever fired,” Howard offered, “but there is suspicion that a small division was lost after a minor earthquake. That quake may have been a shell from this baby.”

The dig, which was backed by Georgia Tech, was scheduled to continue indefinitely. “I have a feeling”, intimated Golden, “that there’s a lot more to discover.”